


Mindless beating

by Multifandom_damnation



Category: The Morganville Vampires - Rachel Caine
Genre: (by drugs i mean vampire blood), Blood Drinking, Cage Fights, Distrust, Drug Withdrawal, Gen, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Punishment, Self-Hatred, set after the events of Bite Club
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-03-20
Packaged: 2019-11-26 15:22:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18182324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Multifandom_damnation/pseuds/Multifandom_damnation
Summary: Shane was born and bred to be a fighter, from his father's influence and the every-day fear of living in Morganville and that was something Glory had prayed upon. She had made him her personal weapon and addicted him to the blood of her kind to make him stronger. A mindless killing machine.But Shane has always been a fighter, long before Morganville claimed him, and now his friends are left to deal with the aftermath of what happened to him. Shane knows he should be doing better than he is and Michael doesn't really know how to help.





	Mindless beating

**Author's Note:**

> I know nobody reads the Morganville Vampires anymore but I've just rekindled my love for these books and now that I'm writing since the last time I read them I thought I'd make my own little fic for them.

It was shameful that the feeling of a face collapsing under his knuckles was something Shane missed. That he longed for the slick touch of blood gliding over his skin. That the red hot fury that bubbled up inside him like the glow of a near-exploding volcano was more a part of him and more familiar than his own heartbeat. Even Claire’s face and lips belonged to a stranger on his worst days.

His father had turned him into a war machine filled with darkness and Glory had grown that part of him like stoking the dying embers of a fire. Fighting was in his veins whether he liked it or not and living in Morganville, fighting for your life was something that was taught in the introductory video. Shane was fast and strong and powerful long before the vampire blood mixed into his energy drinks turned him into a mindless weapon for other people’s enjoyment so repeatedly punching his fist through the crisp white wall of his bedroom was easy. Nobody had wanted to invest in a punching bag for the backyard in fear for Shane’s recovery and there was no way in hell he was going to the gym anymore despite how much of a reprieve it used to be for him, so ruining his bedroom wall was the closest he could get to relieving the stress that bunched up in his joints.

Besides, his knuckles bled the same way no matter what he hit.

He didn’t hear anyone come up the stairs and force their way through the barricade he had pushed up against his door and he continued not to notice until someone with freezing cold hands, an engagement ring on their finger and rough callouses and blisters across their skin from many mindless hours playing the guitar reached around him from behind and grabbed his fist before it could impact the wall again. “Stop.” Was all Michael said but the one word still carried more weight than it had any right to.

Shane’s other fist paused when his momentum was taken away and he breathed heavily through his nose. He didn’t even try and pull away from Michaels’ grip because no matter how fast or how strong Shane thought himself, a vampire was always faster. “Did Claire send you?”

“No.” Michael was usually a man of many words, and sometimes _too_ many when he was upset. One word answers were not really his style and if Shane didn’t know him any better, he’d say it was worrying if it wasn’t Michael. He only ended fights and tried to avoid starting them at all costs- Shane knew him enough to know that this wasn’t a fight Michael wanted to get into.

“Come to check on the poor little lamb who needs protecting?” Shane tried to keep any hostility out of his voice but it was hard when red still danced across his vision. Michael released his hand and Shane yanked it away and it fell, still clenched to his sides. “What are you doing here?”

Michael took an even, calming breath. “I’ve come to make sure you’re alright. It sounded like a warzone from downstairs and the girls were getting worried. I thought I’d better come up before you destroyed the rest of my home.”

“You’re the landlord. If you really had a problem with it you would have kicked me out ages ago.” Shane said despite knowing that it wasn’t true. He turned around, rubbing his wrist, and saw his friend for the first time that day. His hair was sleep-rumpled and his skin was pale, more so than usual, and his shoulders sagged in a way Shane wasn’t used to. “You look like shit. I hope you fed before you came up here.”

Scoffing, Michael folded his arms across his chest and shifted his feet. “I just woke up. What’s your excuse?”

Shane hadn’t really looked into a mirror for the last 24 hours but he could infer what Michael was talking about. “Well, when someone starts throwing punches and you can’t fight back you’re going to get your ass beat.” And he probably looked like he got his ass beat as well- he’d had to block attacks from a man much larger than him and with much more intent to go down swinging. He could still feel the pain from his split lip and the blood that had dripped from his hairline and into his eye. He could already feel the swelling and the bruising around one of his eyes.

Immediately Michael’s whole demeanour changed. He dropped his hands to his sides and his mouth opened in shock. His shoulders relaxed involuntarily and he almost reached a hand out to place on Shane’s shoulder but stopped himself just in time. Shane looked too much like a wild stay dog or a cornered tiger for Michael’s liking. “You can fight man, just not unnecessarily. Without reason. And that sounds to me like it was within reason.”

“And what then Mikey?” Shane demanded. “One hit becomes two and then three and suddenly I’m beating an unconscious man to death. Do you really think I want to go through that again? It’s just easier to sit back and shut up and hope that it’s over soon because anything is better than seeing that look on your faces again.”

Michael leaned up against the small space of the untouched wall near Shane’s destroyed bed. That, like the rest of the room, was ruined. “It’s really that bad?”

“I don’t know what you want me to say, man,” Shane sighed, shoving his hands in his pockets. Despite the small amount of time that had passed, his hands refused to unclench, and he could feel his short nails digging half-moon indents into his palms. “I was born and bred to be a fighter. It’s in my blood. Glory got to me because she knew what am and to suddenly no longer be able to fight is like a choke chain around my neck or a target on my back. Always looming over me. Restricting. And if I do fight, if I do use the skills I was taught, then I could easily go bad again and I could be at risk of hurting either one of you.”

Biting his lip, Michael sat heavily on the bed. “There has to be some way we can help. Some way we can… I don’t know, vent your anger.” He caught sight of Shane’s knuckles then, bleeding and bruised and horrible. “Some way that doesn’t involve you hurting yourself.”

“I don’t think anything short of tying me down and knocking me out is going to help at this point.” Shane reluctantly moved to join Michael on the unmade bed and dropped his head to his hands. “It feels like it’s burning me up from the inside sometimes. Like the only way to get rid of it is to drown it.” He turned his head slightly to look at his friend and pillowed his head on one hand. “Is that what it’s like when you feed?”

Michael nearly choked on his spit. It was such an unusual and unexpected question that he wasn’t exactly sure what he was going to answer. “I don’t- I guess you could say that if you wanted a metaphor but it’s a little different.” When he glanced at his friend Michael felt his heart seize in a way it hasn’t done in a look time and felt something within him shatter at the look on Shane’s face. “Hey, Shane, it’s alright. I’ll… we’ll figure something out. There has to be something we can do.”

“Most days I wake up and feel like I’m drowning.” Shane’s voice flat and hard, devoid of all emotion. “Sometimes I don’t know where I am or even who I am because there's a fire in my veins and red behind my eyes and if I don’t sit there for a moment and just breathe and wait then it’s like waking up from one reality into the next. And sometimes… it makes me feel like I’d rather be in that reality than this one.” He took a deep breath. “I don’t think it was those energy drinks… I mean, the vampire blood they addicted me to. I think it was the fighting.”

Biting his lip, Michael moved to place a hand on his friend’s shoulder but pulled himself back. It didn’t seem like Shane wanted to be touched at the moment. “What are you the most worried about?”

“Hurting one of you,” Shane replied instantly like the words were already bouncing around on the tip of his tongue before Michael had even the chance to ask them. “Any of you. Eve would probably rip me a new one and you’re fast and strong enough to break me to pieces before I even moved and Claire’s a badass in her own right and would probably beat me down without even trying but... I don’t even want to think about it. Because I’m not exactly a scarecrow and I know, no matter how much I dry to deny it, that if I get a hold of one of you I will do some damage.”

That was a reality that Michael knew all too well. He knew how strong Shane was when he was rational and aware of himself- Michael didn’t even want to think of what he would be like if he wasn’t in the right headspace. Frank had turned him into a weapon even as a child- that was just another thing that Michael hated Shane’s dad for. And he knew that if Shane had the intention to hurt in his heart and anger in his mind that he really would hurt someone- and that would probably end up being someone he cared for. And as he looked at him Michael knew that Shane had thought about that many times already. “I won’t let that happen. You know I won’t.”

“And if you’re not here?” Shane said. “What if you’re off performing somewhere or having a meeting with Amelie or Oliver, and I’m home alone with the girls? What if I snap and I attack Claire or Eve and you won’t get here in time to stop me? Stakes and crossbow bolts will hurt like a bitch, sure, but it won’t kill me like it would a vampire.” He met Michael’s eyes then, and his were haunted and dark and more scared than Michael had seen them in a long time. “What if you come home and they’re both dead and it’s my fault?”

He didn’t want to admit it but Michael knew in his heart of hearts that that was a very real possibility. He knew, no matter how much he wished he didn’t, that if that happened, it would be Michael’s job to take care of it. And judging by the way Shane was meeting his eyes, he knew too. “Hopefully it won’t ever come to that.”

“But it might.” Shane pointed out, unhelpfully.

“But it might.” Michael sighed, reluctantly agreeing. “But let’s not talk about that now, alright? We have to start ordering you new furniture-” he waved a hand at the destroyed bedroom, ripped asunder and completely unliveable and settled on the wall with holes the size of fists punched through the plaster. “-and I have to call someone over to come and fix that.”

Shane shook his head and pointed and Michael saw a kit beside the broken dresser that seemed to contain all the things needed for wall repair. “Don’t worry, I got it. I took an online-class the first time it happened so you didn’t need to pay and nobody had to find out so I’ve just been fixing it for the past couple of months.”

Now that Shane mentioned it, Michael had been noticing strange spots on the walls where the paint didn’t particularly match all that well and just waved it off as the house’s magic doing its own thing. “You’ve been breaking things and fixing them up before we could find out? For months?”

Michael was surprised at the way Shane shrugged as if it was no big deal. “Yeah, it’s fine. I didn’t want to give you more reason to get rid of me.”

“Oh shut up- you know we have no reason to get rid of you.” Michael shook his head. “You know I’d never do that. You’re my friend Shane, my best friend, and I’m not giving up on you without a fight.”

“I don’t know,” Shane said wearily as he pushed up from the bed. “But I think that if you don’t give up on me soon, a fight it all you’re going to get.” And then he was gone before Michael could call for him or reach a hand out, the door shutting quietly behind him.

Something painful and heavy burned in Michael’s chest as he listened to Shane’s heavy footsteps down the stairs. He knew, realistically, that there was nothing he could do to stop him but he refused to believe that Shane was right. There was no way Michael was giving up on him, no matter what.

He moved to the window when he heard the front door open and watched as Claire ran out after him and tried to pull him back. Michel could see why- the sun was setting and soon humans out for an evening stroll would be in danger of being dinner for hungry vampires. He didn’t need to worry though- Shane didn’t resist Clare’s hold and she pulled him into a hug. Shane wrapped his arms around her and crushed her tiny frame to her chest as he placed his chin on the top of her head.

And Michael, left alone in his best friends decimated bedroom, was left to wonder what they were going to do next.


End file.
